


Wednesdays Are for This

by magpiespirit



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Asexual Relationship, Asexuality, Aziraphale is a Nerd, Blend of Book and Show, But Mostly TV Canon, Crowley is an Internet Troll, Discussions of sex, Getting Together, Hostile Bookshop, M/M, Post-Canon, References to The Arrangement, They were dating all along, This Author Is Not Kind to Certain Internet Communities
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-03
Updated: 2019-07-03
Packaged: 2020-06-03 07:03:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19458862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magpiespirit/pseuds/magpiespirit
Summary: "D'you think we should have sex," he asks idly, pressingposton his addition to the exclusive How to Summon and Bind Demons forum. This one, he's sure, will both give Hell several annoying headaches and make a dent in the problem of demonology rising in the incel community. Bless, he loves having free time."I think," Aziraphale replies frankly, giving Crowley areally, nowlook over the rims of his stupid glasses and the top of a first edition of something that probably uses a hundred words to say what could be said in five, "thatshouldis a word best left to Heaven and Hell."And Crowley, who was only looking to fluster the angel a little, belatedly remembers that he's gottencommendationsfor Aziraphale's temptations.





	Wednesdays Are for This

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Français available: [Les mercredis sont faits pour ça](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22209826) by [Likia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Likia/pseuds/Likia)



> Aziraphale, by all rights, ought to be one of the Cherubim: an angel with a flaming sword guarding Eden's eastern gate. The book and the show designate him as a Principality, which...okay, we can say that God was like "eh, whatever, let's just move Eden and make you an emissary in title since you _lost your flaming sword,"_ but what I can't figure out is why he'd be answering to a gaggle of Archangels. Maybe I'll write about that someday. For now, it's just vague headcanon that Aziraphale is a Cherub but hangs out with the humans anyway and maybe just has no idea he's higher up in the hierarchy, because he's always been a nerd and was calculating probabilities when he should have been learning about himself, idk, who cares, _Good Omens_ is just good fun.

Wednesdays are for lazing around and doing whatever he wants.

More accurately, every day is for doing that, but today is a Wednesday, and Crowley intends to thoroughly waste it in creative ways, up to and including seeing how long it takes to get his best friend to Make The Face. You know the one: pinched lips failing to refuse to smile, stress lines softening around the eyes, _I don’t know why I put up with you other than this inconvenient fondness,_ the one that makes Crowley feel simultaneously smaller than anything and bigger than everything. One of his most recent favorite pastimes is to find out how many different ways he can evoke The Face.

It’s a nice thing he’s got going with Aziraphale, crowding into the already-crowded bookshop whenever he likes — the angel protests sometimes, but he always has an extra glass or mug available, and never actually asks the demon to _leave,_ just accepts the intrusion with no more than mild exasperation (usually with joy and dated language Crowley can pretend to be annoyed by) — and otherwise being left alone, at least until one of them decides it’s time to do something else together. It’s been an adjustment, too, realizing that he _can,_ not tasting that tang of electric panic every time they have a no-longer-illicit outing.

He tried being good. He _did._ It lasted exactly three days, and then he had to do _something_ to relieve the tension building up, relieve the temptation-induced pressure. His nature is demonic, and that isn’t going to change. It’s only his methods that have changed, now. He’s quite fond of internet trolling, which he didn’t invent but will gleefully take credit for; it’s a mildly evil form of entertainment that, if applied appropriately, can make the worst kind of people _lose their fucking minds._

(He likes leaving short, succinct anti-religious YouTube comments on particularly bigoted and sanctimonious channels, not necessarily because he cares to rob onlookers of their faith, but because Aziraphale can never decide whether he should condone or condemn it, and that’s the best kind of mischief.)

Today they’re both as snug as they can be in the angel’s lair, Aziraphale sitting ever so primly in a wingback armchair and Crowley stretched out lazily across some kind of ridiculous divan with a shiny new smartphone in his clutches. He’s got his left leg slung along the raised backrest and his right leg stretched out on the floor just to spare his back, because the divan is miraculously, _fiendishly_ lumpy and no amount of demonic intervention can thwart the determination of a secondhand bookseller who wants to put off potential customers. It’s a good day; in just two hours he’s prompted no less than three long, winding rants about how The Gays Are Bringing About The End Of The World just by suggesting, under the pseudonym CrepesexualAngel (this is an obviously hilarious tribute he’ll get around to admitting eventually), that the heteros are statistically more prone to unplanned pregnancy and messy divorces and maybe it’s time they got their heads on...well, straight.

Okay, he might have said some things that were a little more inflammatory this time. In his defense, it was either that or getting inflammatory with the book pile he accidentally kicked on his way over to the couch. He understands the need to make the shop as hostile to humans as possible, but has Aziraphale got to make it hostile to poor Crowley’s feet, too?

He snickers at yet another ALL-CAPS RANT. This is so much fun. Minimum effort, maximum entertainment, and the best part is that these souls were already destined for Hell, so he’s not actually doing any legwork for his former employers. Just letting off some demonic steam.

“What are you doing?”

Aziraphale looks mildly concerned, which is progress. The first time Crowley did this in front of him, he said he could “feel” the evil (read: mischief of the mediumest order) radiating through the shop. Crowley rather thinks it was the neighbor man beginning his affair with his secretary, but that’s a matter for another time. Crowley just shrugs against the uncomfortable headrest. “Public service, angel.”

Angels were not built to be expressive, and while _his_ angel is able to emote more than others, he often stays in the range between “delighted” and “somewhat less so,” at least until something large and unpleasant — like the end of the world, or waking up to a room inexplicably filled with giant spiders — forces his face to do more things. It’s surprising, therefore, that Aziraphale’s expression falls directly into “witnessing a tragedy somehow even more disturbing than the crucifixion of Yeshua” territory.

(This is a learned skill, Crowley is sure. If that same event happened _now,_ they’d probably both cry, and then promptly drink enough to risk discorporation. That, too, is a matter for another time, preferably never.)

“You,” Aziraphale accuses, “are doing something evil on the internet. Again.”

“The internet is a den of sin and depravity anyway. I’m just another faceless batch of screen names sowing the seeds of discord and malcontent. Besides,” Crowley justifies with a winning smile, wiggling his phone at Aziraphale, “I’m about to make things _very difficult_ for Head Office downstairs.”

“Well, that’s…”

Crowley rolls his eyes at Aziraphale’s consternation and navigates to one of the newer places on the internet: a forum by and for “incels” (whatever they are; as far as he can tell, they’re just all-around Hellbound anyway) who believe in the occult enough to try to cast spells and summon demons to — for whatever reason — _force_ women to have sex with them. None of their spells are legitimate, and the one binding ritual that comes close to being workable calls for a sacrifice of four oxen at each compass point, so it’s functionally useless. Not that it would actually summon an incubus, as those don’t exist. It would probably summon a lesser demon who would barely last a second outside Hell.

Crowley’s about to give them a bona fide summoning ritual that will call forth Lilith, who does _not_ take kindly to those kinds of requests, and will probably _eat_ the summoner in question.

He doesn’t understand these people, honestly. So much vitriol and hatred over what amounts to a few ugly noises and unpleasant fluids _dripping_ everywhere. Clearly they’ve never driven at high speeds or had an Irish coffee. But the topic _does_ give him an idea…

“D’you think we should have sex,” he asks idly, pressing _post_ on his addition to the exclusive How to Summon and Bind Demons forum. This one, he’s sure, will both give Hell several annoying headaches and make a dent in the problem of demonology rising in the incel community. Bless, he loves having free time.

“I think,” Aziraphale replies frankly, giving Crowley a _really, now_ look over the rims of his stupid glasses and the top of a first edition of something that probably uses a hundred words to say what could be said in five, “that _should_ is a word best left to Heaven and Hell.”

And Crowley, who was only looking to fluster the angel a little, belatedly remembers that he’s gotten _commendations_ for Aziraphale’s temptations.

He’s not tempted, exactly. There’s no point in sex or manifesting _bits_ or anything like that, but the mix of disapproval and amusement — and the blatant show of disrespect — sets a spring trap in Crowley’s chest. His is an unconventional kind of love, in that it sneaks up on him in times like this and then leaves him be until the angel does something to evoke it again, but it’s never actually gone, just...not the big brass band all the movies say it’s supposed to be. 

Aziraphale didn’t say anything but the truth, and somehow he managed to make it sound taboo, sinful, all the things a demon ought to enjoy. It was _Aziraphale_ behind Martin Luther’s grievances (both sides thought it was a job well done), a gentle whisper, a careful hint, a still, small voice saying all the right things. Take courage. Do not doubt your convictions, for you are Right. Crowley got to witness that particular masterpiece, and it was…

Well. This isn’t that, but it’s temptation nonetheless. Temptation to exist better, he thinks, but he could be projecting. 

Unfortunately for both of them, Crowley doesn’t back down from a battle of skill when he is reasonably sure he can win, so he smiles a slow, serpentine smile and says, “You’ve gotten bolder since the last time you tempted someone, haven’t you?”

“Are you tempted, _Crowley?”_ His chosen name sounds like dark chocolate in Aziraphale’s mouth as the angel sets aside the old tome and moves, with purpose in the lines of him, from the armchair to the divan. It’s funny; the angel futzes with his bowtie and looks exactly like he always does, but from this angle the sun hits him at the perfect angle to halo his body, and he doesn’t look like a man, he looks divine. Crowley feels the dip along his whole body as Aziraphale sits at the foot of the divan. They aren’t even touching and it’s like he licked a battery. “Would you like that? Is it one of _your_ human indulgences?”

And suddenly, it’s clear. If he knows his best friend (and he does), this careful placement between Crowley’s legs, the deliberate cadence — it’s an offer, not a tease, but Crowley is so used to being denied on the first go-round that he didn’t quite recognize it for what it was. That, and it doesn’t appeal to him, and as far as he knew until right this moment, it didn’t appeal to Aziraphale either. His thighs burn uncomfortably at the realization and he scrambles to sit up straight, coming dangerously close to kicking the angel in the head in the process. He makes a sound not unlike the squeaking of a hamster trapped in a radiator. “No — no, I was only — no, I don’t. Do that. Ever. You see. Ever. No.”

He sounds like he’s on drugs.

“You sound like you’re on drugs,” remarks Aziraphale, unfairly unperturbed. If Crowley had human lungs he’d probably be hyperventilating right now. As it is, all the light’s gone funny.

“You’re the one saying weird things,” he accuses hypocritically. If anyone asks (they won’t; who would?), he’ll say hypocrisy is his duty as a demon, but the truth is, he’s not used to his own mischief backfiring. M25 disaster aside, oh, and he supposes the night he delivered the Antichrist and brought down all the mobile networks counts too, he’s usually the one laughing in the end.

Aziraphale looks vaguely affronted. He should emote better. Crowley resolves to give him lessons when this madness is behind them. “You asked me! I thought...it’s never been an interest of mine, personally, but you’ve done _so much_ for me, and if that _were_ what you wanted from me in return, of course I would endeavor to — to give it a go. I _have_ read about anatomical structures and the, er, mechanics. Never did meet a book I could leave unfinished once I started, after all.”

“Angel. I do _not,”_ he says emphatically, taking Aziraphale’s hand and looking him directly in the eye, “want to have sex. With you, or with anyone else. I just wanted to ruffle your feathers.”

“Oh. Oh, good.” Aziraphale puts his free hand over his chest and breathes out a shaky breath, and Crowley thinks maybe holding hands is a mixed message, but he might as well see it through. Besides, neither of them seem to mind, and Crowley _doesn’t_ want to have sex, but he does like the touching. Skin on skin, a spark of divinity that might hurt if it didn’t feel so nice; Aziraphale is present. He’s _there._ He’s real, not discorporated, not some hallucination Crowley’s conjured in a fit of grief. Aziraphale, not being privy to these thoughts, keeps going. “I _am_ willing, for you, but I’d rather not.”

So this is how it is: an angel and a demon, both (most likely) defective and certainly _defected,_ best friends, holding hands and discussing sex and Aziraphale’s eyes are big and brown and earnest. Humans have human tells, little microexpressions around the sockets and the mouth, a little scrunch of the nose or brows, that speak of honesty. Ethereal beings just...radiate it. The fire in their eyes gets a little dimmer when they lie, or at least, that’s what happens to Aziraphale. Crowley avoids other angels, always has. 

The angel doesn’t look away, doesn’t break eye contact. Eyes are so weirdly magnetic. What is it he sees in Crowley’s demonic, slitted ones? What truths is he learning that haven’t been told already?

Crowley breaks the stare first and looks down at their loosely clasped hands resting on the beige divan between them. There’s quite a bit of room between their bodies, but it’s a comfortable distance he’s rather not close yet. Sort of lamely, he tries to explain, “I’m attached to this body, you know. Would rather not make any additions.”

“We’re old,” Aziraphale agrees.

“And there are all those...bits,” Crowley adds, waving his free hand off to the side at empty air. “Lot of effort to manifest them no matter what they look like. Inside, outside, both...outside’s easier, but it’s still too much for so little payoff.”

“Vessels and nerves aren’t easy to just will into existence, and manifesting the wrong smooth muscle and connective tissue, all of that nonsense, would be embarrassing for all parties.” Aziraphale’s laugh could reasonably be called a giggle, but Crowley won’t call it that. “Imagine forgetting the urinary meatus!”

“Best not,” Crowley affirms, although he’s out of his depth. Every time he manages to forget his best friend is an _incurable nerd,_ he goes and says something incurably nerdy. “Glad we’re on the same page.”

“I suppose now’s as good a time as any to ask _why_ you want to be on the same page, if you were just teasing,” Aziraphale puts in, and _seriously?_ Is he really asking — is he suggesting— 

“I just...I thought,” Crowley says, once again waving at empty air. He thinks of Alpha Centauri and tries not to feel cold. “After everything. You and me. Was I wrong?”

“Oh. I hadn’t really thought about it in... _those_ terms.” Aziraphale stares at him — stares _through_ him — and he doesn’t hide. There are some things that can’t be unsaid, and he’s been saying them since he asked the angel to run away with him.

So this is how it is: Aziraphale would be willing to make an effort to have sex he probably wouldn’t enjoy, and _still_ hasn’t given it the name Crowley’s called it for centuries now. “Crowley, we’ve been courting for a long time, haven’t we?”

At his core, Aziraphale is still, unquestionably, an angel. He might be slightly defective, the only one of his kind, but there are some things intrinsic to his nature that will never change. Crowley, as a demon, can relate. It’s not a bad thing to be true to oneself, to be honest, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt like something holy to realize that all the little things Crowley’s obsessively read into have been _just another day_ to Aziraphale. Angels don’t love, but Aziraphale does, so sometimes Crowley forgets that angels, too, are beings of cold temptation and influence. Where demons influence the darker nature, angels influence the lighter nature. Cherubim in particular were designed to inspire awe and submission.

Crowley fell for it. He doesn’t _mind,_ but this is a harsh wake-up call.

“Only if you want it to be like that,” he replies quietly. He knows his own mind; he fell for Aziraphale, not for the angel. But the angel is always lurking just below the surface, and the last thing Crowley wants is for his _best friend_ to think he has to accommodate and reciprocate something very, _very_ human.

“What I want…”

The pensive look isn’t new. He always looks like this when he’s chewing on a new equation, but as far as Crowley is aware, _he’s_ not usually a variable in transtemporal physics or whatever theoretical projects Aziraphale takes up to keep his mind busy between miracles and cake. It hurts somewhere deep in his chest, not the human heart he doesn’t need but the core of him, the pulsing light that was born of God and twisted by brimstone and Hellfire, but he manages, “Yes. What you want is important.”

“It might surprise you to hear that I don’t generally think about what I want, in the metaphysical sense. You know I enjoy life’s little pleasures,” muses Aziraphale, sounding like he hardly knows he’s saying this aloud. He _still_ hasn’t let go of Crowley’s hand, and doesn’t seem likely to stop, squeezing it as he is now. “I love humans. I’m delighted by their inventions. Their music, their foods, their passions. I can’t help but love them. It’s easy; even when I’ve seen them at their cruelest, their capacity for kindness far surpasses that of any angel in Heaven. I never felt that with you, Crowley. It was never a helpless thing. I grew fond of _who_ you are, over time. Angels aren’t built for the kind of love you’re suggesting, so I never considered that I might be able to feel it. When I’m with you, I feel...reverence, the likes of which I’ve never felt for anyone but for Herself. Yes, I think I _am_ in love with you, and it is not a recent development.” 

“On the same page,” Crowley says again, grinning like an idiot.

Looking somewhat anxious, Aziraphale blurts, “Nothing has to change, does it? If we call it the kind of love involving courtship, we can continue on as we have done, with a new understanding.”

“We can do whatever we want, angel.”

“Right.” Aziraphale nods like he’s made an important decision, and maybe he has. “Should I kiss you, then, or shall we forego that particular tradition?”

“Someone told me that _should_ is a word best left to Heaven and Hell,” Crowley quips, holding onto Aziraphale’s hand like a lifeline, and…

Yes.

Success.

_The Face._


End file.
